Talking Points # 6

One more River to Cross-Charles Lawrence
Whites Swim in Racial preferences- Tim Wise

In the article by Tim wise he argues that think that affirmative action always is connected with minorities and people of color, but in actuality there has always been affirmative action programs for whites for hundreds of years.

In the article by Charles Lawrence argues that Brown vs. the board of education was a great stride in the U.S. the court still kept making alternative ways to make sure that blacks were considered inferior. The article went more beyond education it was about how african americans were discriminated in all realms of American Society.

"Yet few whites have ever though of our position as resulting from racial preferences. Indeed, we pride ourselves on our hard work and ambition, as if somehow we invented the concepts"
White privilege has existed for many years and white people have always benefited from it. This relates back to Delpit and the codes of power. Many people who have white privilege don't realize that they benefit from it, and when they are questioned they become defensive and don't want to see the real existence. As the article showed white people benefited from many different things. For examplee the part about in the 1930's to 1960's how 15 million white families benefited from FHA loans, but people of color denied these programs. To have this privilege a group of people must be excluded as seen here. The blacks were denied loans, but 15 million white families were able to get the loans.

"In short, segregation American-style, like South African apartheid, has only one purpose: to create and maintain a permanent lower class or subcaste defined as race. ...They are kept separate because the separation labels or classifeies blacks as inferior beings."

Through all the court cases they were able to tip toe around the 14th amendment and other amendments that were supposed to help blacks become citizens and have rights. For example the case Plessy vs. Ferguson with separate but equal although it was supposed to keep things fair that didn't happen. Schools that were white had better teachers, facilities, etc while schools that were of color were run down overcrowded and didn't have enough staff. By doing the separate but equal clause it prevented blacks from having a good education and kept up the message that government was saying that you aren't good enough.

"Equality of education is not enough. There can be no equality under a segregated system. The American negro is not a dominant minority; therefore he must fight for complete elimination of segregation as his ultimate goal."

The victory that Brown vs the board of education was a step in the right direction for people of color, but there was still many other battles that had to be fought so that segregation would be completely gone. There was still separate facilities, taxes when voting, etc. Having schools unsegregated in schools is good, but like the article stated whats the point if they are raised in an environment where there isn't segregation and as soon as they leave taht school again they are back in a segregated society. Even if someone went to a good school that was diverse and segregation wasnt there they would still face discrimination in the workplace, on the streets in voting etc. To make a better environment for all the african american segregation has to be wiped clean oout of government,politics,schools etc.

I thought that this reading was interesting, but at the same time boring. The reading had good points and kept my attention ,but at times reading the court case and going on and dragging bored me a little. This goes well with the text that was assigned with this one by Tim wise because his article shows how the white people benefit from white privilege and this article shows the negative impact of white privilege on how it shows a group that they are inferior and can't succeed. Out of the two readings the article by Tim Wise was more interesting to read. This one was too, but after reading the same thing i became a little bored.